Book Reviews

Ireland and Empire: colonial legacies in Irish history and culture, Stephen Howe. (Oxford University Press, £25) ISBN 0198208251

Stephen Howe calls his Ireland and the Empire ‘a discourse about discourses’. It is actually a cut-and-paste polemic against nationalist historiography, post-colonial discourses, interdisciplinary literary criticism, Field Day, and Edward Said. Howe doesn’t like the comparisons the Irish make between themselves and others. Managerial rather than discursive, the book strings together obiter dicta, ceremonial academic … Read more

Prelude to the Easter Rising: Sir Roger Casement in Imperial Germany, Reinhard Doerries. (Frank Cass, £21.85) ISBN 0714680702

On 28 June 1914, Sir Roger Casement delivered an oration beside Shane O’Neill’s stone, above Cushendun, deep in the Glens of Antrim. It brought to an end six months of recruiting of Irish Volunteers and proved to be his last public address in Ireland. The following day he travelled to Glasgow and from there by … Read more

The American Irish, Kevin Kenny. (Longman, £68.95) ISBN 058227818X Encyclopaedia of the Irish in America, Michael Glazier (ed.). (University of Notre Dame Press, £94.95) ISBN 0268027552

Forty-five million people in the United States of America claim some degree of Irish heritage. Yet Irish America is often little understood on this side of the Atlantic. Too often Irish Americans are stereotyped as either romantics, nostalgic about a country they have never seen, or as uniformly racist, prone to supporting causes they do … Read more

The Aftermath of Revolution: Sligo 1921-23, Michael Farry. (University College Dublin Press, £16.95) ISBN 1900621398

The relative inertia of the Sligo IRA during the Anglo-Irish War did not prevent the county witnessing protracted violence during the Civil War. This illuminating study, providing both a chronological and thematic account, begins with an overview of the rise of militant nationalism in Sligo. The campaign of 1919-1921, denoted by minor skirmishes and acts … Read more